Sentence Examples:
The barrister had halted in the doorway to turn over a sheaf of papers that he held in his hand, and, as he replaced the red tape which bound them together, he looked up and our eyes met.
Stevens might have been seen in his dingy office, seated at a rickety desk which was covered with various little bundles, carefully tied with red tape.
It was very difficult to sever the red tape of the army regulations, and enable the commissary department to issue rations to men that belonged to no regiments or companies.
After much official red tape, she found herself in the midst of scores of maimed and dying, just brought from the defeat at Fredericksburg.
The Summary Commission sat for the first time, and with a courageous disregard for the despotism of red tape, proceeded to business.
As she is extremely independent, impatient, and enterprising, with a haughty disdain of red tape, the reasons for this uncommon secession may be left to the reader.
A bit of red-tape legislation permitted the people to ratify the choices at a "primary," to be held some months later; but the election came now.
This fact was attested by the occasional strips of pasteboard, on which were marked various descriptions of papers, as well as by bits of red tape that had secured the bundles.
McAllister had been fully occupied in untying, one after another, knots of red tape, and that, so far, perfect organization had been impossible.
"Sorry we had to have so much red tape about it," the sub-station agent said, when Larry came back with the magical paper that opened the mouths of the subordinates.
The rising generation has more instruction, and has entered the career of material improvements; but I doubt if the present red tape routine will produce a race having the shrewdness of their fathers.
I encouraged him to pay no attention to those vexatious bureaucratic formalities with which, under the slang phrase of "red tape" our military system is overburdened.
He was a slave to red tape, and was prepared to die rather than diverge from the narrow grooves in which he had been trained.
It was an undignified scramble of the red-tape worms of various departments to be well out of the way before those slow, heavily shod feet of labor arrived upon the scene.
"Certainly not; but if I had asked to have your Confederate friends paroled, a thousand yards of red tape would have to be expended before it could be done," added the engineer with a laugh.
This preserves the elasticity of the Administrative Order and prevents red tape from developing and hampering the work of the Cause.
A great deal will depend on the viewpoint of this special commissioner; he may be a stickler for red tape, with no concern for the service, as were the post commander and quartermaster.
Saul put him with all possible despatch through the red tape necessary to secure his acquittal, and then led him out by a side door.
Say some in bitter disappointment, but red tape demands that we wait till the flagship sees fit to signal us to come for letters.
He spent the savings of years in petty bribes, trying to hasten the process, but was detained ten months by bureaucratic red tape.
Considerable time was consumed in the preliminaries, and there was red tape to be untied, but in general no unnecessary obstacles were thrown in the way even of a woman.
Never lose your dignity, of course, but tie it up in all the red tape you can find around the office, and tuck it away in the safe.
A quarter's experience of it convinced me that the thing was a piece of abominable red tape: I do not mean in theory, but in the results of its working in that particular case.
My uniform and kit were ready in a few days; and in spite of the multitudinous calls on the War Office officials, I can say in defense of red tape that my papers were made out very quickly.
Never a slave to "red tape," he will promptly cut it wherever and whenever it stands in the way of the readiest service of books and information to all comers.
Search was at once made for the passport and money belonging to Barnwell, and after a deal of red tape had been unwound the property was found and restored to him.
A reverse to this mode of fighting invariably lost the battle to the French and Spaniards, who were, as a rule, all tied up in ethical red tape.
While Graham walked away chuckling at his banter of this red-tape official, the official himself stood gasping like a fish out of the water, and trying to realize the insult levelled at his dignity.
The boy had been honorably discharged, but there were no blanks, and red tape forbids a surgeon, no matter how high his position, to grant the final discharge without the blank forms.
Although I had no acquaintance with this bank's methods, yet I was confident that all those at the top must be a stupid lot of red-tape sticklers, and I resolved to do my business with them alone.
Here, somehow or other, the things about him did not seem so much absorbed in the past, notwithstanding those untroubled rows of papers bundled in red tape.
The comic man of the company enveloped in a white sheet, with his head tied with red tape like a brief and greeted with yells of laughter whenever he appeared, was the venerable priest.
He then bound together, with red tape, a wand consisting of three sprigs taken, respectively, from an ash, birch, and white poplar.
All unnecessary red tape is dispensed with, and the cost to the author who is seeking thus to protect himself in the enjoyment of the profits of his work, is so small as to be scarcely appreciable.
In the face of what appear to be iron-clad rules and endless red tape, it is a problem how these things can happen without the knowledge of responsible officials!
Business has taken the place of red tape, and General Hastings has turned the freight depot into offices for his various departments, for a system has been established which will reach all the victims, bury all the dead, discover all the living and clean up the town.
A long string of red tape, surely; and it might have been considerably shortened to the advantage of all, as it was later on.
And how should a volunteer, called into the service of his country without a particle of military education, be expected to understand the interminable routine of army red tape?
Month after month passed by wasted by the usual governmental red tape, and when all preliminary arrangements had been made and the contract for the actual building of an experimental boat was to be drawn up, a sudden change in the administration resulted in the dropping of the entire plan.
As for the government, it could well claim that its persistence in pushing through this part of the road nearly offset its red-tape carelessness in permitting the rebellion to come to a head.
There was, first, the red tape in the naturalization proceedings; and second, ignorance of English and of American geography, history, and form of government.
Securing a passport for a Middle's trip, not to speak of a Lower's, involved such endless bureaucratic red tape as to be nonsensical.
The population was undoubtedly not altogether content in 1972 and often chafed at bureaucratic red tape, at lackluster performance on the part of minor officials, and at other irritations.
There was something about it that quickened an instinctive curiosity, and made me undo the faded red tape that tied up the package, with the sense that a treasure would here be brought to light.
Books, newspapers, or reading matter in any form if found among a traveler's baggage is generally taken possession of by the officers of the customs; but if one is willing to submit to the necessary red tape and expense, they will be returned to him upon his leaving the country.
This would seem incredible to those who have never dealt with an inert officialdom, a red-tape bureaucracy, but such is the fact.
Sometimes there is so much red tape prerequisite to obtaining a library card that a bashful man does not dare to make the attempt.
The relations who stay at these hostels are guests in every sense of the word, and there is not one trace of red tape or the faintest feeling of obligation about the whole thing.
One thing that is detrimental to the success of the bounty system, is the invariable "red tape" connected with such laws.
The Act was surrounded with so much red tape and the landlords' interests were safeguarded at every turn, which enabled them to put obstacles in the way and make it most difficult to obtain land that we could let to the men at reasonable rents, and our progress was very slow.
Jed had gone to the railroad, bound for the Springs, to untangle a mess of red tape that had snarled about his filing on some land.
The vicar of Box, however, was a stickler for red tape, and it appears that he found some technical objection in the fact of the man not sleeping the night in the village.
Then an official investigation was made and after a great deal of red tape ceremonies and other preliminaries, it was thought best for the interests of the Indians, as well as for the safety of the white settlers, to transport them to the Dry Tortugas.
All the red tape of the American lodge was observed in this society, in which most of the members knew nothing of parliamentary law and had never taken part in debate.
A requisition for instruments was a long time in being filled, owing to the vast amount of red tape in use, so the officers at our fort presented me with a drum.
This commission, at long distance and by methods hopelessly involved in red tape, sought to direct the activities of the engineer in charge on the Isthmus.
Near the top, were numerous papers tied into packages with red tape, and two large envelopes carefully sealed with dark-green wax.
Pluming himself not a little on his victory over red tape, as he considered it, Harry Appleton returned to London and remained there for two or three years, interesting himself in all sorts of fantastic schemes which were alike in two respects: they cost much money, and they failed.
The warders, neither good, bad, nor indifferent, merely machines wrapped up in red tape, did their best to help him in this.
These were called "service rules"; they were really folds and coils of the monster Red Tape, at his work of binding and strangling.
Well, I would get a cashier's check from the Whitney National Bank in New Orleans and sometimes the City Bank Branch, which our company had an account in, and I could get it through without a lot of red tape that way since I worked for the company and all.
Red tape was cut, forms were dispensed with, and the meager supplies of the army were hurried forward with the utmost despatch.
Stuart was not only an educated, but a heaven-born soldier, whose natural genius had not been stifled by red tape and the narrow rules of the schools.
They were hung with red tape to which were attached little American flags, the whole held in place on the table by a delicate bronze anchor suggesting hope (I suppose).
May it be many a long day before the forgotten shipment of red tape finds its way to the Territory to strangle the courtesy of our officers!
These men, the born administrators of our over-seas dominions, are lost to the Empire, because of the red-tape exclusiveness and jealousy of the ruling classes of this country.
My red-tape-bound soul stirred in its prison and peered out at a strip of sunlit country where free men made of life a joyous adventure.
Red tape has strangled initiative in collectors, magistrates, and district officers, and has left them no time for personal intercourse with those they govern.
Red tape cannot laugh; but we feel kindly toward the pleasant fellow, light-hearted enough to poke fun at a viceroy from behind prison bars.
Possibly it had been lost as emergency followed emergency on the international scene, possibly it had been strangled in red tape as regulation followed regulation on the national scene.
We must clear away obstacles to new growth: high taxes, high regulation, red tape, and yes, wasteful government spending.
Here, after passing through a low door in an immensely thick wall, once again I found myself in an atmosphere, not merely of red tape, but of the very essence from which tape, and redness, are made.
On the French side, the necessary parchment, red tape, and seals were prepared, and the official ink flowed two years after blood had flowed like water.
He submitted to the usual red tape proceedings and evasive diplomacy for two days, and then threatened to open fire on the city unless the sailors were forthcoming.
Everybody had talked so much about the coming of "red tape" that I had been a little nervous about the change; but, except just in the transition stage, everything has gone very smoothly, and when everybody gets used to the military ways I think it will be all right.
His intelligence does not rebel against red tape, which is so distasteful to his lively contemporary from the town workshops.
I had taken so many Indian prisoners that never required any red tape, I naturally supposed that the same rule would be applicable in this case, but I got away with it just the same.
The leaves were crossed with red tape, and every here and there sealed with red sealing wax, but by breaking off a bit of wax we could read a few words, and though I do not remember why, we seemed to associate their meaning with some record of the North-West.
His charges are not made for the common reasons that it is a futile palliative, that it works toward graft and expenses wasted in red tape, but for the more vital reason that it becomes an actual force of detriment and oppression to those it is supposed to aid.
It's an awful welter of red tape and incompetence where I've just come from, but I don't want her as a healing process till I feel a little stronger.
His reply showed that at least red-tape methods do not prevail at his office, even though moral courage may be lacking in the postmaster.
The latter, on having the silk handkerchief in which it was tied, removed, and coming in contact with the table, resolved itself into numerous loose letters, which, escaping from the piece of red tape that once had confined them, spread themselves before the eyes of our heroine.
Suffice it to say, that the antique, red-tape-ridden and muddle-brained policy of trying to build new ships of the modern type under military methods was in the main abandoned.
There was such a beautiful absence of red tape about the new institution that it only needed a word in the right ear to set things going; and then, with a long pull, a strong pull, and a pull all together, Joe Collins was taken up and safely landed in the Home he so much needed and so well deserved.
The decree was issued apparently with fear and hesitation and the motorist was hedged about with restrictions and hampered with endless red tape regulations.
The formalities detained us but a few moments, since with the great influx of motor tourists during the exposition year, much of the original red tape was dispensed with.
He must be located, which would involve no great difficulty, and then, granted his consent could be gained, it would take the red tape of the law an indefinite time to unwind.
The young lawyer struts along in his seven-league boots, has a white-bound book in one hand, and a parcel of papers, tied with red tape, in the other.
Eight hours of red tape, bluffs and counter bluffs, persuasion, threats and pleadings, it took before the business was completed, and it was five in the afternoon when I saw the official launch with Morris and the Greeks sitting in the stern, coming out to us.
Happily, in making this concession to the men who are offering their lives to their country, the genius of red tape contrived to assert itself.
This item of news closed the missive, which must have gone a circuitous round of red tape it was so long upon its travels.
This dual nature of the matter enabled him to carry out his work with a minimum of interference from red taped officials, while at the same time he was able to command the resources of State Departments in any line wherein they could be of service to him.
I would often slip the papers out of their red tape and peruse them far more diligently than I did in after days, when I was paid for doing so.
Macdonald saw that he must be ready to offer help, or red tape and loyalty together would seal the lips of men in the service, lest they should seem to be casting a slur on the army administration.
The latter is a fascinating place, with less red tape about consulting the books than in any other place of the size in London.
Having disposed of this temperate refreshment, she arose from her stool, tied her papers into a formal packet with red tape, and taking them under her arm, marched out of the office.
It took us hours to land on account of the red tape that had to be unwound, and then there was an extra delay of which I was the innocent cause.
"The one necessary requirement for continued success is that governments keep from being enveloped in political red tape," said he.
The red tape which is used to embarrass justice or "tie up" reform commands no reverence even from the party that employs it.
He had wintered and summered in the department for a great part of a century, until he had almost grown to be a piece of the desk at which he sat; his memory was a mere index of official facts and documents, and his brain was little better than red tape and parchment.